


Good Liars

by anonymous_sibyl



Category: Battlestar Galactica (2003)
Genre: Multi, Threesome
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2008-04-25
Updated: 2008-04-25
Packaged: 2017-10-04 04:12:56
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,020
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25833
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/anonymous_sibyl/pseuds/anonymous_sibyl
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"You have a way of trying to tie people here, old man. To the world. To life."</p>
            </blockquote>





	Good Liars

**Author's Note:**

> This work is licensed under a [Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 United States License](http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0/us/). None of the media or characters written about in my fanfiction belong to me and I make no profit from these works.

"You remember, then, Saul?"

"I do." He lifted the edge of his patch and rubbed the sore skin beneath his eye. "I thought we'd agreed to forget that. Buried that one away with everything else we did that we don't so much like."

"Things happen," Bill said. "Things we aren't proud of, things we don't tell our wives or children."

"_My_ wife knew."

"Did she… did she talk about it?"

"Just the once and never again. I wouldn't have it." He stared fiercely across the table. "You have a way of trying to tie people here, old man. To the world. To life."

"I couldn't let you go. Not then, not now."

"Some things you don't have a choice in."

"Some things I do."

 

* * *

 

_"He's dying, Ellen, can't you see that!"_

"He's dying, or you are?" Ellen sat on the low table in front of Bill, legs slightly open, skirt brushing the tops of her knees. The drink she held in her hand tilted to the left, droplets of ambrosia spilled to the floor. "If he's coward enough to die then maybe you should let him."

"Are you that much of a bitch, Ellen?"

"Ask your wife," she shot back. "Next time you speak to her, that is. She does still allow you to contact the family, doesn't she?"

"She's a better woman than you."

"But I'm the woman who's here, and I'm the woman you need." She crossed her legs, exposing a long length of thigh as she moved. "He isn't dying," she said. "He's killing himself. Slowly. And he's taking me with him."

"He's taking a bit of us all."

"More of me."

He nodded his agreement.

"And you think this will work."

"I think he needs us."

"Not me," she said, easing forward off the table and sinking to her knees. "Never me."

 

* * *

 

"I thought about killing you that day," Saul said. "Couldn't decide if I should beat you to death with my hands or shoot you."

"She jumped the gun."

"Always did, my Ellen." He accepted the refill Bill offered and swallowed it down. "I never knew why she did it."

"I suppose she loved you."

"Or she wanted to frak _you_." He pushed his chair away from the table. "Remember how I found you, sitting in my chair, my wife on her knees in front of you, you with your hands in her hair?"

 

* * *

 

_Ellen looked lazily up over her shoulder at the noise, hands still working on Bill. "Hello, Saul. Awake for your second binge of the night? Or is it your third?" _

"Bitch," he slurred.

"Saul."

"Bill. She's my wife, Bill." He leaned drunkenly against the doorframe. "She's the one thing I have."

"You have me, too. You have us both." Bill looked down at Ellen, his cock in her hands, then across the room at his friend. "Come here. Now."

He stumbled, fell, went crashing into the chair and the table, but he went. He never had anywhere else to go.

 

* * *

 

"You think I'm dying, is that what this is?"

"I think we're all dying."

"Yeah, we are." He placed his palms flat on the table, and stared at his wedding band. Ellen was dead, murdered, but he still wore it. "Whole frakking human race, dying out and being replaced by machines."

"I need you here, Saul."

"No, you don't." He pushed Bill's hand away from his. Can't let anyone touch him, not now he knows what he is. "You've got your son. He's a good boy, Bill."

Bill sighed. "He's stubborn."

"Like father, like son." He waited for Bill to laugh, kept talking when he didn't. "Roslin, you've got Roslin, and Starbuck, and you've got this whole gods damned crew. Don't need me."

The old man turned away, but not before Saul recognized the expression on his face, the same one Bill wore when he fired on the enemy, the same one he wore when he'd tell Saul about having to punish his kids. His dirty business face.

"She's dying. She's dying and I need her. And you can help me keep her here."

He laughed, but it didn't sound like a laugh to his ears, it sounded more like a cry. "Sex can't cure cancer, Bill."

"It can make her feel needed."

"Make me feel needed, you mean."

 

* * *

 

"Gentlemen," Roslin slid her robe from her shoulders and let it fall to the ground, "you'll need to be somewhere in my vicinity if this is to work."

Bill dropped his head and sighed but Saul laughed. "Smart, your lady," Saul said.

She scowled at him. "I should make you call me Madame President."

"And I should walk out the door but the old man here wants us to get along." He crossed his arms over his chest. He didn't trust her, but Bill did, and this was all about Bill no matter what he said differently.

"Has he always been one for crazy schemes like this?" she asked.

"He hasn't told you?"

Laura turned to Bill. "Hasn't told me what?"

Saul answered for him. "About my wife. About the last time we did this."

"He hasn't," she said. "And somehow I don't think I want to know. I rather like to assume I'm special."

"You are," Bill said.

She laughed and when she did all the tension drained out of him. "I'd ask you to confirm that, Colonel Tigh, but somehow I doubt you're that good a liar."

"Lady, you have no idea."

Bill wasn't going to move and neither was he, so it was a good thing Roslin had more courage than both of them. Hell of a woman she was, not that he'd admit it to the lying bitch. Reminded him of Ellen that way, she did.

When Bill closed his eyes as Roslin touched him Saul realized that this time, no matter what lies were told, it was Bill who needed tying to the world. So he stepped to them and if in the morning it would become one more thing never to be spoken of, well, he was keeping plenty of secrets now, one more was nothing.


End file.
